My particular feeling about conspiracy theory in general and why people who are otherwise normal -- they're not clinically paranoid -- is that we like stories that make the world dramatic," said Peter Starr, the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at American University and a studier of the increase in paranoia and conspiracy in contemporary culture, on Sunday.

"If David Stern is pulling some strings like the Wizard of Oz, it makes the world dramatic," Starr said. "And it gives the person who articulates the conspiracy theory some sense of importance, because they've uncovered it. It's like, everybody else is duped, but I'm not duped."

Starr's webbook, "We the Paranoid," takes a historical look at past conspiracy theories, from the Kennedy Assassination to UFOs, and why we are so susceptible to them. He is not a basketball expert, but after spending a few minutes researching the various NBA conspiracy theories over the weekend, he reached a quick conclusion.

"They're totally consistent with everything I study," he said.

........

"They felt the Bush Administration -- which couldn't even manufacture weapons of mass destruction in Iraq -- could bring down the buildings without being detected," he said. "We don't want bumbling. We want an antagonist who's strong. If the Celtics blow a play, it can't be because they blew a play; it's because they're throwing the game. We want our antagonists to be hypercompetent and evil....why would Orlando get two first round picks when they're a small market team? That just gets ignored...there's a kind of selective attention there."

And conspiracies are counterintuitive: the more proof one produces to refute the theories, the more people believe the theories

Cool theory, but it makes us all seem insane. Starr is basically saying no matter the facts in front of you, your mind is creating the conspiracy. We WANT to see the lottery as DS's personal little game, so that's how we see it.

Question is, how much was Aldridge paid by Stern to write this up? Seems like propaganda to me..

Cool theory, but it makes us all seem insane. Starr is basically saying no matter the facts in front of you, your mind is creating the conspiracy. We WANT to see the lottery as DS's personal little game, so that's how we see it.

Question is, how much was Aldridge paid by Stern to write this up? Seems like propaganda to me..

I think this is exactly why it isn't done out in the open - aside from being impossibly boring TV. They could still document the whole thing to debunk the theories and put it on NBA.com where it doesn't have to be good tv. But think of what would happen. People would go over it frame by frame and find that many more things to dispute.

What really needs to happen, is a shift away from placing so much emphasis on franchise players that get locked in place for as long as possible, to placing the most emphasis on building strong teams and allowing for greater player movement to make that feasible for any team with a solid plan. Then all of this becomes less important, and the sense of victimization is far less dramatic. There was a time when picks 1-3 would be traded without a second thought. Now - the way the CBA is structured, there's just now way it happens. Selling the one predominant talent is all that matters, arguably more than winning, although "the star" and "winning" have become one-in-the-same in the way the game gets sold anyhow, so that is a difficult argument to make. Just the way those two ideas have converged shows how too much emphasis gets placed on something like winning the lottery. Fans don't benefit in the end (unless they like feeling victimized, and some do wear that like a badge of honor), most star players don't benefit (since they could be so much better as part of well-constructed teams), and owners and GMs end up relying far too much on shit that is out of their control so it's hard to see where they couldn't be benefitted from a change.

Of course there is no change coming, and every year we will hear the same outcries until it becomes hard to care anymore.

The Raptors have put some pieces in place, and if they get center Jonas Valanciunas over next season, they'll have two-thirds of their frontcourt set, with Valanciunas joining 2006 first-round pick Andrea Bargnani. The last one-third should come in June. Harkless would make sense here if he's still on the board, though he'd be making the transition from power forward in college to small forward in the pros. Jones would be doing the same thing, but he's proven to be a better 3-point shooter in college than Harkless was. Sullinger would be a safe pick; the Raptors have thought about a frontcourt with the 7-foot Bargnani at the three spot.

Couldn't disagree more with this blurb. I don't want any of those guys, Terrence Jones maybe if we traded down a little. And moving Bargs back to the 3? For real?

People don't come up with conspiracy theories in the NBA to feel good about themselves uncovering a hidden truth that no one else knows, they do it so they have someone to blame for their teams lack of success. I can't say this is true in other conspiracy theories but in the NBA this doesn't hold.